Daily Racing Form National Digital Edition
‘Pharoah’ popular in Australia
Three years after he captured the imagination of the racing world, Triple Crown hero American Pharoah is continuing to make waves worldwide, with commercial success in his young stallion career now extending to Australia.
American Pharoah, who entered stud in 2016 and is based at Coolmore’s Ashford Stud in Kentucky, shuttled to Coolmore’s Australian farm for the first time last year. Mares carrying foals from what will be his resulting first Southern Hemisphere crop made a splash at the Magic Millions Gold Coast national broodmare sale this week, led by Sabatini selling for $850,000 to Kia Ora Stud.
“We supported [American Pharoah] with our Americanbred mares and in November last year, I looked at a lot of American Pharoah foals while I was over there, and I was very happy with them,” Kia Ora’s Alex Kingston told ANZ Bloodstock News.
Sabatini, a well-bred multiple group stakes winner, is one indicator of the quality of mares sent to American Pharoah in his first Australian season, for which Coolmore said he was booked full. The daughter of Street Cry put together a solid 2014-15 racing season, winning the Group 2 Polytrack Angus Armanasco, Group 3 Kevin Hayes, and Group 3 Lister Quezette Stakes. All those races were at Caulfield Racecourse, where in 2014 she also finished third in the 1000 Guineas.
Sabatini is out of Group 3 winner Royal Sash, making her a half-sister to Group 3 winner Vivi Veloce. The latter mare also was offered in foal to American Pharoah at Magic Millions, fetching $500,000 from Dean Hawthorne Bloodstock. It is the family of Australian champion Valley of Georgia, Hong Kong Derby winner Valley of Gospill, and multiple Group 1 winner Happy Trails.
Another mare in foal to the Triple Crown winner, Better Alternative, sold for $750,000 to YuLong Investments. The winning Flying Spur mare is the dam of four-time Group 1 winner Preferment and Group 3 winner Rezoned. Better Alternative is a half-sister to three stakes winners, including Group 1 winner and stakes producer Ancient Song.
American Pharoah will again shuttle to stand the Southern Hemisphere season, which begins June 1, at Coolmore’s farm in the Hunter Valley, north of Sydney in New South Wales. He will enter mandatory pre-export quarantine at Ashford’s on-site facility in late June before making the trip over the summer. He returns to Kentucky in December.
Lookin At Lucky on a roll
Less than a decade after he was a classic winner himself, Lookin At Lucky hopes to get lucky in next week’s Belmont Stakes as the broodmare sire of the enigmatic Gronkowski – and is looking ahead to a big summer after closing May with a bang.
Lookin At Lucky has had four individual runners earn Beyer Speed Figures of 100 or higher through the month of May – tying him with perennial leading sire Tapit atop Daily Racing Form’s exclusive sire lists in that regard. The Coolmore stallion’s top Beyer of the year was the 111 posted by Accelerate in the Grade 1 Gold Cup at Santa Anita – with runner-up Dr. Dorr completing the exacta for their sire.
Accelerate, who also earned a 110 Beyer winning the Grade 1 Santa Anita Handicap, owns the fourth- and fifth-highest Beyers of 2018 to date with those two performances. Unlike his sire, who was a juvenile and 3-yearold champion, Accelerate did not start until age 3 and has blossomed as an older horse. He won the Grade 2 San Diego Handicap last year, defeating a field including Arrogate, and was third in both the Grade 1 Pacific Classic and Breeders’ Cup Dirt Mile. This year, at age 5, he has won 3 of 4 outings and has pushed his earnings past $1.7 million to rank as his sire’s highest earner.
Accelerate and Dr. Dorr’s performances in the Gold Cup keyed a major weekend for Lookin At Lucky, also recently represented by Money Multiplier, who won the Grade 2 Monmouth Stakes for the second time.
Lookin At Lucky now looks ahead, starting with the Belmont Stakes, where Gronkowski, forced to miss the Kentucky Derby due to illness, will attempt to win his fifth straight race. The Lonhro colt is out of the unraced Lookin At Lucky mare Four Sugars.
One week after the Belmont, Lookin At Lucky’s classic-placed millionaire son Lookin At Lee is expected to start in the Grade 1 Stephen Foster Handicap at Churchill Downs.
The stallion also has an intriguing runner waiting in the wings for a summer campaign in unbeaten Chilean champion Wow Cat, who is preparing for her U.S. debut. The filly has been working steadily at Belmont for trainer Chad Brown, most recently going five furlongs May 28 in company with Grade 2 winner Pacific Wind, who is bound for the Grade 1 Ogden Phipps on the Belmont Stakes undercard.